The face births from a metal box. At first it’s ambiguous as to whether this face is being born or if it she simply awaking from a routine slumber. Details like the closed eyes and the white, untouched face suggest the former. And with the television set being the only other object in the room, her fate would seem inevitable any time she did emerge. So we’ll call the opening scene a birth.

The television, powerfully situated about the face, turns on. It shuffles through the televerse before settling on the image of a single face, which looks much like our face. Our face is fixated. She advances to the screen, opening herself as she would her soul. I say her “soul” because she seems to identity herself with the imaged face, which indeed looks quite like her. As if standing before a mirror, she mechanically, as if instinctively, dresses her face to precisely match the imaged face. She smiles for the first time.

The television retreats, shuffling once again through the televerse before settling on another, more detailed face. Our face gives a curious expression, one of both irritation and alarm. She advances farther, mimicking the imaged face as before. This time she replaces her eyes. No longer merely trying to look like the imaged face, she is sacrificing her own body to become the imaged face.

The television retreats again, but this time it is too far for our face. She claws for the television like a candy rolling down a long table. With trepidation in her eyes, she knows she can go no further; but she will risk her life to see the final face. In the end (with a beautiful climax) it costs the face her life.

The television goes static. Her face is shattered. Silence.

Notice this link between the television and the face. The television, which fed the face her entire life experience, activated when she opened her eyes and turned off when she collapsed. The face, born as a blank slate on a mechanical, non-living and non-humanoid body, absorbs its only life stimulant, the television, like a fly attracted to a light. The more she feeds from this stimulant, the more she scours her blank slate, and the more addicted to the television she appears. Her attraction to the television ultimately leads to her demise, and also the television’s demise.

Both the face and the television appear to be dependent upon one another. In that case, is life dependent upon experience, and experience upon existence? If this isn’t a literary tragedy, it’s at least a philosophical mindtrip.

What I find most troubling is the very last scene, when the camera zooms out and the television our face is held captive in turns off. Does this signal death? Does it suggest that the whole video was only an idea? A prediction? A message? Does it refute itself? I wouldn’t say that this greater television represents a surveillance, because we are already viewing the action through our own monitors. No, this television within our own monitors has some deeper symbolic significance. Notice there is a final flicker before it shuts off, just like the face’s television. I’d say the greater television represents our own version of the face’s television. In that case, we are the face, and we have turned off with the television. One final question remains. What is the television?

Thanks for sharing this video, Serena. I could carve out some other facets of meaning in it, but I’d like to see what other people have to say.